EDITOR'S TABLE. 



Naturalists need not feel unkindly just now towards representative 

 Dingley of Maine, who introduced a bill for the destruction of the seal 

 herd of Behring Sea, which has passed the lower house of Congress. 

 From the point of view of the lover of nature this bill appears to be an 

 atrocity, but everything does not appear on the surface. The sole ob- 

 ject is to destroy the commercial value of the herd, so as to put a stop 

 to the slaughter by reckless Canadian poachers. A sufficient number 

 will be preserved to serve as a basis of a new herd, whenever the Brit- 

 ish and Canadian Governments are ready to join hauds with us in the 

 effort to preserve it. The Dingley bill is really a plan for preserving 

 the herd and not destroying it. The fact is that our neighbors across 

 the border have been running up a bill of small accounts against 

 themselves, which will in the aggregate prove burdensome to them 

 some day if continued. It is poor policy for a weak party to make 

 itself unpleasant, especially when the stronger party is desirous of 

 friendly relations. Canadians and Americans are really one people, 

 and we ought to combine not only to protect the seals, but to increase 

 theirs numbers, and develop the industry which depends on them. 



Some naturalists think it is quite the proper thing to protest that it 

 is of absolutely no importance whether they receive credit for a discovery 

 or not, and it is more than intimated in print from various quarters 

 from time to time, that interest in such questions is quite inconsistent 

 with the lofty aims of science. We must confess to having become 

 somewhat weary of this alleged elevation of sentiment, for we find 

 human nature to be in scientific investigators not so very different from 

 that which is common to the rest of mankind. Under the circum- 

 stances these protestations savor of cant. The naturalist like other 

 men must live. In order to live he must be known ; hence necessity 

 forbids that he hide his light if he have any, under a bushel. And in 

 fact the majority of naturalists do not do so. They understand the 

 value of honest advertising. The product of a laborer should be labelled, 

 first for his own advantage, and second for the information of others, who 

 know his personal equation. What we want is honest goods with 

 honest labels, and for these no protestations of pseudomodesty, or 

 depreciation on the part of unpractical idealists, is in place. 



We are pleased to notice the excellent scientific work which is being 

 done by the Field Museum of Chicago. The management has called 



